Chapter 177: The Temporal Weave The implications made his head spin. He was sitting here, millenniums in the past, watching the very foundations of the future he came from being laid in real-time. The timeline was converging, history crystallizing around him, and he had no idea if his presence here was part of the original pattern or a deviation that would unravel everything. "That’s the current state of things in our world," Casmir continued, pulling Finn from his spiraling thoughts. "The situation is..." he paused, finding Finn’s gaze again, "...unprecedented." The word hung in the air with deliberate intent. "So they want every Transcendent on the ground to handle this new development. That’s why only I was sent to retrieve you." He gestured to himself with a self-deprecating smile. "As the Space bearer, if anything goes wrong, at least I’d have a better chance of bringing everyone back by figuring out some spatial shenanigans." "Wait," Himothy interjected, frowning. "If the situation is as serious as you’re describing, how is all of this still secret? The number of breaches you mentioned would mean that at least some of them would go out of hand. The public would at least be curious, no?" "Yeah," Finn nodded. "And if somehow, no one is curious, the Arcana would surely have been." A low hum of assent escaped Thalia’s lips. As a Royal herself, she knew just how curious the Arcanist association was. And knowing fully well that besides the upper echelons of the three great vassal families of Astoria, no one else had no knowledge of Transcendents or breaches, she was sure things had gone out of hand. Casmir’s expression shifted, something between resignation and dark amusement crossing his features. "It’s not secret anymore." Silence fell around the fire. "The governments went public," Casmir explained. "Five days after you entered this world, when the sporadic breaches were reaching critical mass, appearing across population centers in tens and hundreds, it became impossible to contain quietly," he sighed. "The major powers made a coordinated announcement." "They revealed everything?" Himothy asked sharply. "Not everything," Casmir clarified. "They controlled the narrative carefully by releasing information about ’planar instabilities’ and ’reality breaches’ but framed it as a natural phenomenon humanity is learning to manage. Positioned Transcendents as an evolutionary response rather than... whatever we might actually be." He poked the fire with a stick again, watching sparks rise. "So I take it the public knows chaos breaches exist now. Knows that certain individuals... Transcendents, have emerged with abilities to combat threats from these breaches. But they don’t know about other planes with civilizations or the true scope of what we’re facing?" Finn asked, just for clarification. Casmir nodded. "How did people react?" Yara asked quietly. "Panic, initially," Casmir said. "Then surprisingly quick acceptance. Humans adapt when survival demands it. The governments positioned it well — ’new challenge, new defenders, humanity prevailing as always.’ Transcendents are being framed as heroes, protectors, the next stage of human evolution." Finn absorbed this, trying to imagine what their world must look like now. Transcendents were public knowledge. Breaches, an acknowledged reality. Everything had changed in the span of days. "But at the end of the day, all of that doesn’t matter if we can’t get back home," Casmir said, pulling Finn back to the present. The seriousness in his voice made everyone solemn. Then Thalia broke the silence, asking: "Have you figured anything out about the breach in this world? Can you replicate it to any extent, even something small?" Casmir shook his head slowly. "The breach back to our world might seem simple from the outside, but it’s extremely complex. When I passed through it, it was exactly as Finn described before you all entered. I could feel it trying to pull me to some random location, trying to scatter my spatial position across this plane." "But that’s not all," he leaned forward, intensity creeping into his voice. "Because I’m the Transcendent of Space, I felt more. Sensed... deeper intricacies than any of you could have..." He paused, choosing his words carefully. "The flow of time here is different from our world. It’s not one-to-one. In our world, almost three weeks have passed since you all entered." "Three weeks?" Deacon cut in with a raised eyebrow, then rubbed his chin in thought. "That makes more sense. It seemed weird that you’d been deployed so quickly. Even with a new breach appearing, it didn’t warrant such an urgent retrieval mission. We’ve only been here about seven days." "Exactly," Casmir confirmed. Then slowly, his eye became vacant as if he was re-living the experience of passing through the breach again. For a second, Finn could’ve sworn he saw awe, deep curiosity, and profound intrigue all mixed together in those eyes. "It’s because of the barrier," Casmir said in a low voice. "The breach itself. Whoever is behind it also has the capability of manipulating time. They’ve woven temporal manipulation directly into the spatial barrier." The others began processing this, trying to understand the implications. Why would someone create a time differential between worlds? What advantage did it provide? Was it intentional or a side effect? But Casmir had already moved past that question. He was muttering to himself now, staring at something only he could perceive. "It felt like the time weave was part of the spatial breach itself," he whispered. "Not separate. Not layered on top... Integrated. As if time and space were..." he trailed off, lost in thought. Finn’s heart thundered in his chest. This is it. This is the moment where Casmir begins to understand that space and time are interwoven. That they’re not separate concepts but aspects of the same fundamental reality! Which means... Hope — desperate, fragile hope — flickered to life in Finn’s chest. If Casmir can begin to master spacetime manipulation, if he can learn to navigate temporal dimensions the way he does spatial ones... Then there’s a chance. A real chance of returning to my original timeline. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎 Finn forced himself to breathe slowly, to calm the racing thoughts. But would I even take it? The question surprised him. Caught him off-guard with its sincerity. If Casmir offered right now to send me back to my own time, to the future where I came from... would I accept? He examined the question honestly, probing at it like a sore tooth. No, he realized with dawning certainty. I wouldn’t. He was invested in this life now. This timeline. He was only just starting to become proficient with his powers, just beginning to understand the true scope of what Error could become. History was unfolding around him in ways he’d never fathomed, ways that contradicted everything Osmund had told him about the past. Going back now would be running away from answers I desperately need. He felt himself beginning to spiral into thoughts about the paradox of his existence, the bootstrap loop of being Arros while also being Finn who learned from Arros’s memories that he himself created, while— No. He stopped himself forcefully. I’m not powerful enough for these questions yet. Nor smart enough to unravel paradoxes of causality and identity. These are questions for someone at the level of the Arros I saw in that Brambleton memory... Or even greater.